About

Claire lived a normal suburban lifestyle in Odessa, Texas, until her ability manifested and her entire world was effectively turned upside down. Initially keeping it a secret, Claire's power was eventually exposed after her experiments with testing her ability's limits were discovered. Because Claire was actually being monitored for years by The Company, she was forced to go into hiding with her family from Company agents seeking to make Claire the subject of brutal biological experimentation into her ability. Claire and her family came out of hiding after the dissolution of the Company.

On a personal level, Claire loved her adoptive family very much, but still remained curious about her origins, until she finally discovered her biological parents and the rest of her extended family. Claire has a kind, yet courageous, nature, but for a time was insecure about her abilities, leading her to be insensitive. With time, Claire accepted her power and considered for a time joining a family of special individuals.

Character History

Claire, having discovered that she has the power to rapidly heal herself, asks her classmate Zach to video her jumping off an abandoned gravel plant and surviving. Walking home, the two come across a train wreck, from which Claire rescues a trapped man, but never takes credit for the incident. Meanwhile, Claire finds herself attracted to Brody Mitchum, though their relationship quickly turns sour when he tries to rape her and inadvertently kills her when she is impaled on a tree branch. Claire is taken to a coroner, but revives when the branch is removed from her brain. To avenge Brody's wrongdoings, Claire causes Brody to have an accident, though Claire walks away unharmed.

At her high school's Homecoming, Claire is pursued by Sylar, but is ultimately saved by Peter Petrelli, though her friend Jackie is not. After the tragic events at Homecoming, Claire decides to tell her father about her abilities. However, Claire is surprised to find that those around her are mysteriously losing their memories, and learns that a Haitian man, under the orders of Mr. Bennet, is responsible. The Haitian befriends Claire, and tells her what little he says he knows of her past, including the fact that her mother died in a fire fourteen years ago. After some research, Claire finds Meredith Gordon, her birth mother, and learns that Nathan Petrelli is her birth father, both of whom are evolved humans.

Life changes for Claire when Matt and Ted take her family hostage, her homeburns, and her powers are discovered by Thompson. Claire is forced to go into hiding from the Company. Eager to be normal and find out about her biological family, Claire travels to New York City and meets the Petrellis. After saving her uncle Peter's life, the two team up to help stop an impending explosion.

Claire attends her first day of classes at Costa Verde High School, and is assured by her father that she'll be fine, who also warns her not to stand out, or else the Company will find them. At school, she meets a boy who can fly and connects with him. When talking about their abilities, Claire notices marks on his neck, and he recalls an experience with a man with horn rimmed glasses. To hide her relationship with West, Claire lies to her father and tells her that she has joined the cheerleading team. However, her plan backfires and when she doesn't make the squad. To pay back Debbie Marshall, Claire and West play a prank on Debbie while she drinks, causing her to get kicked off the team, and leaving a spot for Claire.

Claire and West continue their relationship and he meets Sandra. As the two spend time, West sees Noah and tries to leave, but Claire tells him that he is her father. Thinking it is a trap, he flies away. Noah shows a newspaper article about her prank, and warns that the family it is no longer safe and that they must move. Claire tells him that if they do, they are leaving without her.

At school on her last day, she is contacted by Bob at her cheerleader practice. He slips up and calls her "Miss Bennet", and Claire runs home. When she arrives home, she sees her father's laptop open with the image of the Mendezpainting that shows his death. Claire then warns her mother that her father was right and they need to leave town immediately, but Bob shows up with a gun, and surprisingly, Sandra recognizes him as the Regional Sales Manager for Primatech Paper. Bob takes Claire with him, and conveys to Claire how valuable she is to them, and takes some blood from her. Bob takes her to switch for his daughter from Noah. Once she reaches her father they hug briefly then he pushes her into West's arms so he can fly her to safety. Unfortunately, Elle is able to zap West and Claire, which sends them plummeting to the earth. Mohinder shoots Noah in the eye and kills him. Claire tries to run to her fathers side but West intercepts her. They land at her house and Claire is left with the task of telling her mom that her father has died.

Bob delivers an urn with Noah's ashes to the Bennets. Claire, her family and West scatter the ashes into the sea. She tells her father that she should have listened to everything he said. When she sees Elle in a car spying on them, she confronts her, punching her hand through her car window and threatening to expose the Company. Claire goes through Noah's paperwork, preparing to go public with her ability and expose the Company's secrets. While packing up her father's files to bring down the Company, West arrives and tries to stop her from revealing his secret. Angered, she gives him his file, and tells him "there is no 'us' to worry about anymore." Afterward, Noah returns home, revealing to his family that he is still alive, thanks to Claire's regenerative blood. He tells Claire not to expose the Company, and informs her that he has made a deal, and will again be working for them. In exchange, his family will be left alone to lead normal lives.

Claire learns that Nathan has been shot and rushes to try and help him. Before she can leave, Sylar arrives and begins to terrorize her with his only remaining ability. Claire manages to stab him but Sylar pins her to the wall and slices her skull. He copies her power and then allows her to regenerate before he leaves. Claire discovers that her ability has changed and that she can no longer feel pain. Once again, she tests her limits by trying to be hit by a train. When the prisoners from Level 5 escape, Claire begs Noah to make her his partner, but Noah instead reveals that Meredith will be protecting the family.

Meredith teaches Claire how to fight and ends up torturing her inside of a shipping container. Claire lies and says that she will not hunt villains, but soon leaves to bring in Stephen Canfield. Upon learning that Stephen is not a monster, Claire helps him find his family. Later, Claire is shocked when Noah treats Stephen like a tool, and she is briefly tricked by Sylar into believing that Noah hates all evolved humans. Claire returns home and teams up with Sandra to find Meredith. She defeats Eric Doyle and, after returning home, runs into Elle. She and Elle travel to Pinehearst to fix their malfunctioning abilities but upon arrival, they find Peter, who is now powerless. Claire helps Peter and then tells Nathan and Tracy where Arthur is.

Pinehearst soon begins looking for Claire, who is believed to be the Catalyst. Claire becomes protected by The Company and Noah takes her to the Canfield home to properly train her. Elle and Sylar come looking for her and Claire ends up being shot. With the eclipse in place, Claire does not heal and actually dies. She regenerates as soon as the eclipse is over and is then rescued from a home invasion by Hiro Nakamura, who takes her 16 years into the past. Claire convinces past Noah not to take Claire back to the Company and successfully saves herself from becoming the Catalyst. Arthur tracks them down and sends Claire back to the present where she, Angela, Noah and Meredith prepare to bring down Pinehearst. Sylar intervenes and holds all four of them prisoner with Primatech. He attacks all of them until Claire manages to kill him.

Two months later, Claire lives with the feeling that Sylar is still alive and killing. She overhears a conversation between Angela and Nathan and learns that the government is rounding people up. She warns Matt Parkman, but both are quickly captured. Claire is given a free pass by Nathan, but she still gets onto Flight 195 and frees the prisoners. After the plane goes down, Nathan sends Claire back home, where she is contacted by Rebel. She is given the mission to protect Alex Woolsly from Noah and she hides him in her house. As Rachel Mills and Jason Pierce search for Alex, Claire and Sandra manage to send him out of the town. They return home and find Eric Doyle, who has received a message from Rebel instructing Claire to help him.

Claire gets a cover job at the comic book store before saving Eric from Rachel. She gives him a new identity and is soon saved by Nathan after her free pass is taken away. The two of them fly to Mexico, where they bond as father and daughter. They are contacted by Angela, who asks to meet with them at Coyote Sands. Nathan and Claire arrive there and help Angela, Peter and Noah dig up the bones of the prisoners that were once kept at the sands. Angela explains what happened in 1961 and privately tells Claire how much she admires her. After the incident with Alice, Claire and the others decide to form a new Company together.

When the family learns that Sylar has taken Nathan's form, Nathan rushes to Washington to stop him. Claire, Angela and Noah attempt to drive there but they are stopped by Noah, who suspects the government is close. Claire and Angela escape capture and arrive in Washington, where they part ways. Claire goes to find Nathan, but he turns out to be Sylar and captures her. Sylar attempts to stop Claire from hating him but eventually throws her out of the room, so she cannot help when Peter and Nathan arrive to fight Sylar. After Nathan and Sylar fly away, she goes with Peter to save the president. Claire later attends the funeral of "Sylar" and expresses her shock at the fact that he is really gone.

Claire returns home to Costa Verde and continues working at the comic shop. She briefly ventures to Lyneboro, where she helps Rachel deal with Kelly, a woman who is manipulating the entire town. Claire returns home and begins helping former Building 26 fugitives return to their normal lives. Rachel shows up one day and after Mensen is killed, Claire learns that a dangerous group believes she has information on a woman named Sabine Hazel. After a run in with Markus Gaines, Claire enlists the help of the Rebel team and together, they drive the dangerous faction out of town. Claire then learns that she has gotten into college.

Hoping to put her chaotic past behind her and return to a normal life, Claire starts college at Arlington University, but these hopes take a beating when she is recognized as a survivor of the Union WellsHomecoming massacre and her roommate seemingly commits suicide on her first day. Claire tests the "Jump, Push, Fall" theory to see if Annie really did kill herself by falling several stories onto the outline of Annie's body, but the girl who recognized her, Gretchen, sees her heal from above. Claire eventually tells Gretchen the truth about her ability, to Noah's disapproval. However, Noah respects that Claire is old enough to make her own decisions now and does not call the Haitian to wipe Gretchen's memory. Claire invites Gretchen to be her new roommate, and they join the Psi Alpha Chi sorority at Becky Taylor's request.

Claire becomes suspicious of Gretchen when she starts acting strangely around her, but it turns out that Gretchen was only crushing on Claire, which she expresses with a kiss. The following night, Claire and Gretchen are taken by Psi Alpha Chi to a slaughterhouse for their initiation. Once at the slaughterhouse, an invisible person tries to impale Gretchen on a large meat hook but Claire takes the fall. She also reveals the assailant as Becky, who promptly flees. This incident scares Gretchen to the point where she decides to move across campus where she would be far away from Becky, leaving Claire alone. Samuel later apologizes to Claire on Becky's behalf and offers her a new family to go to where she will feel accepted for who she is. After Thanksgiving dinner, Gretchen arrives to tell Claire how much she misses her, and she agrees to be her roommate again, but first, Claire tells her that she is going to check out Samuel's mysterious carnival. Gretchen says that she is going with her.

When they arrive at the carnival, they are greeted by Samuel, who shows them around. After witnessing an act of violence against Samuel, and his empathic response, Claire decides to stay at the carnival for the weekend and sends Gretchen back home. At the weekend, Eli's persistent observation causes Claire to feel suspicious, which is only made worse by the discovery of Noah's Primatech files in Samuel's trailer. Once she realizes that Samuel killed his own brother, she tells him that she is leaving, and he lets her go in the hope that she will forgive him. Upon checking her phone messages, she is struck with the news of Nathan's death, and arrives at his funeral by taxi to pay her respects.

Later, Claire is confronted by Sylar when she returns to college, who plays a game with her in an effort to make her understand that they are not so different because neither of them want to be alone. Claire admits how much Gretchen means to her and starts holding her hand in public when Sylar leaves. When Claire returns to Noah's apartment, Lauren informs her of of the true nature of Samuel's power, so she decides to return to the carnival to warn the carnies.

Samuel admits to his crimes and Claire arranges his surrender. Before Samuel can be escorted out of the carnival grounds, Eli shoots at the carnies, injuring Claire and killing Lydia. Angered, Samuel locks Claire and Noah in a trailer and buries it with his power. They are saved by Tracy Strauss, and once back on the surface, Claire informs the carnies of Samuel's plans to bury the crowd in Central Park. Once the battle is over and Samuel is arrested, Claire decides that she can no longer hide who she is either way, and makes use of the local news reporters by jumping from a Ferris wheel and healing in front of them, and revealing the existence of evolved humans.

Claire exhibits the power of rapid cell regeneration, a trait that allows her to recover from almost any injury in a matter of seconds. She also feels relatively little pain from even serious injuries, including burns and compound fractures, although she did grimace when her hand was damaged while retrieving a class ring from a running garbage disposal. She has not yet reached a limitation in her powers. Along with the injuries stated above, she suffered an injury where her neck was broken and turned around 180 degrees. This would be fatal for most humans. Indeed, between her tolerance for pain and seemingly unlimited healing potential, Claire is somewhat similar to the X-Men character Wolverine. Panettiere herself even loosely compared Claire to that same character when explaining her powers during an interview.

Apparently, Claire cannot heal an injury if a foreign object is obstructing the wound. This is true of other characters with healing factors, who can still heal incorrectly, incompletely or not at all if certain conditions are not met, just like normal humans. For example, in the first episode, the bones of Claire's ribs were sticking out at one point. After a comment from Zach brought this to her attention, Claire had to move them around a bit before they would heal properly. The injury she received in One Giant Leap was billed by a TV Guide article as an extreme test of her powers. In this incident, she was clinically dead for hours, only to revive when the tree branch that killed her was removed. Her healing powers restored her to health despite the destructive biological processes that happen to bodies immediately upon severe trauma or death (brain death, lividity of blood in the tissues and coagulation of same, etc.). Still, as stated before, there were still limitations. Her upper torso had still been spread open from the classic "Y Incision" made in the chest of autopsy subjects and she had to close the flaps of skin back into place manually before they healed.

In Lizards, Claire cuts off her small toe with a pair of scissors only to see it grow back. This suggests that Claire is able to regrow a body part even if it is completely removed. This is later confirmed in Brother's Keeper, where she loses an entire foot and quickly regrows it.

In Cautionary Tales, it is heavily suggested that Claire's blood will heal any wound in any person if it is introduced into their system.

A painting by Isaac Mendez and Peter Petrelli showed a cheerleader's body dead at the feet of a shadowy figure, with her head sawed open and her brain removed. Once thought to be Claire, it was theorized that such an injury might well be fatal. Future Sylar was able to take Claire's ability by telekinetically sawing her head open, and in The Second Coming, Sylar removed the top of Claire's head and stole her ability without killing her. Her skull and scalp healed as soon as Sylar put the displaced part back where it was supposed to be. Although Sylar told her that she's special and couldn't die, it's unlikely that Claire could survive complete brain removal or decapitation.

In Into Asylum, when Claire consumes a mass amount of alcohol to win a game, her competitor comments on how she doesn't even look drunk. She later admits to Nathan that her liver heals itself, resulting in everlasting sobriety.

In June 13th, Part One, Claire dies in childbirth of cardiac arrest from a traumatic seizure. For an unknown reason, her power does not bring her back and she permanently dies. Her father is unable to understand this as Claire always comes back when her weak spot is not blocked which it was not this time. In June 13th, Part Two, Angela realizes that Claire's son Nathan inherited Arthur Petrelli's ability absorption powers and took Claire's abilities from her as she gave birth, resulting in her death when she endured complications during the childbirth.

Claire's Age

There are conflicting references as to Claire's age and birthdate. Before production began, a press release noted her age would be 17. In the televised episodes, a newspaperarticle reported Claire's age as 18 months during the fire on February 28 1992, which would put her birth in August of 1990, and her age as 16. In The Fix (which takes place in October 2006), Claire says she is "almost 16"; this would suggest that her birth was in or after October of 1990. Also, in Building 26, Claire notes that Noah has been telling her that Sandra and Lyle are safer knowing less, since she was 15. Given this would have taken place in 2006, this places her birthday around 1991. Further, Claire's birth mother tells Nathan that their daughter is now 16 (Run!), and later (in March 2007) she calls Claire a "seventeen-year-old girl" (One of Us, One of Them). Claire is a junior (Distractions, Four Months Later...), and most juniors are 16 or 17. Claire's MySpacepage indicates her zodiac sign as Aries (which would place her birthday between 21 March and 19 April) and places her birth in 1989. In the commentary for Godsend, Jack Coleman states that Claire has just turned 16. In an interviewTim Kring stated that Claire is 16. At the 2007 San Diego Comic Con, Hayden Panettiere said her character is 15. Incidentally, Claire does drive (Collision); and the legal driving age in Texas is 16, though a driver can obtain a permit at age 15. In March 2007, Mr. Bennet gives Claire a Nissan Rogue for her birthday, which they note is "next month" (April 2007). A fake prop driver license auctioned by NBC lists her birth date as March 10, 1993 (though it should be noted that the license never appeared in any canon source, and lists false information for Claire). Pinehearst's file on her list her birthday as January 11, 1991 (see file) (It's Coming). In Exposed, Sandra explicitly said Claire was 17. Further, Claire attends college during Season Four, implying that she is eighteen years old. This means that Claire was born anywhere from 1989 to 1991, depending on when the season is set.

Trivia

Claire reveals she discovered her ability the summer before season one on the day of her adoptive mother's, Sandra, birthday on June 8 through a deleted scene from Nothing to Hide (released on the DVD). She wanted to surprise her mom with brownies, when she accidentally cut open her thumb with the knife. And by the time she ran over to the sink, it had regenerated itself.

In a deleted scene from Seven Minutes to Midnight Claire and Eden McCain seem to be long time friends and know each other very well. On the original scene from the episode, they barely talk as if they don't know each other.

Claire collects teddy bears from all around the world. Her father brings them back to her from his "business trips". (Six Months Ago). In a deleted scene from Company Man, it was Claude who gave her the first teddy bear.

The Odessa Register calls Claire a "Mysterious Good Samaritan". This is a reference to the parable of the Good Samaritan from the Bible (Luke 10:25-37). Jesus told the parable to demonstrate that mankind should show compassion for all people.

According to Brody, Claire never drinks plain milk--just chocolate. She draws mermaids in the margins of her notebook. She puts crackers in her sandwiches to make them crunch. She's usually the first person to laugh at a joke. (One Giant Leap)